Pokémonization

   Someone on the Internet talked about Lucifer, the TV show. They said, “Get Ready For Lucifer’s True Final Form!”

   At first, in 2016, Lucifer had glowing red eyes. Then, he sported beautiful angel wings. Then, he showed us his devil face. Later, Lucifer lost his angel wings. Later still, on Netflix, he got demon wings instead. Then, a full demon body. And finally, he was revealed with his devil face and demon wings and demon body all at the same time.

   Lucifer Mega EX, if you will.

   Slowly but surely, everything is being “pokémonized.” Everything in the mainstream media – and also in tabletop role-playing games, obviously.

   In role-playing games, it translates into each individual paragraph having its own little title. Reading through monster descriptions, each new paragraph has a header or subtitle: “Malicious Glee,” “Challenging Lairs,” “High and Mighty,” “Chained to the Grave,” “Dwellers in Darkness,” and so forth – like lists of powers and effects on Pokémon or Magic cards.

   Incidentally, the first Monster Manual was the original set of critters with stats, but instead of acquiring 10 little monsters at a time in random booster packs, you purchased the complete monstrous collection all at once, from Rot Grub to Demogorgon – from Smeargle to Mewtwo.

   The Monster Manual was so damn popular in ’78 and ’79 that it spawned a monster creation craze in the UK and the rest of Europe, which they called “The Fiend Factory.” Yep, that’s where the Fiend Folio comes from.

   The “build” philosophy is another pervasive effect of pokémonization: you no longer just roll up a new character, you build one – like you build a powerful, kickass deck.

   In First Edition AD&D, a level 10 ranger with STR 18/00 and a +3 longsword could strike a Troll or Hill Giant and do a minimum of 20 points of damage, and he or she got a second attack in that same round. Maximum possible output: 54 damage in one round. A 1e Hill Giant can have up to 66 Hit Points.

   What else do you need to build here?

   Before the pandemic, one of my players decided that his new cleric was a hermaphrodite. That’s cool. A few weeks later, I emailed him a two-page backstory that (kind of) made his character an offspring of the Cat Lord... because the Cat Lord looks pretty androgynous to me. No new shapeshifting powers, no formidable DEX bonuses or catlike reflexes – just a nice and slightly wicked background.

   The character’s mother had gotten lost one evening, and was being pursued by a bunch of zombies – like in Thriller. The Cat Lord showed up and rescued her. The next morning, two giant panthers escorted the young woman back to her village. A few months later, her parents found out that she was pregnant. “The Cat Lord’s baby!” she repeated. Village elders went to find the Cat Lord, demanding explanations. But the Cat Lord insists that the child isn’t his – like in Billie Jean.

   Player gives Dungeon Master something to work with; Dungeon Master gives player something new and original. Player has the right to refuse, of course.

   He could have said, “No way. I hate it.”

   But he didn’t.

   Another player sold his character’s soul to a devil in exchange for two experience levels. That’s gold, right?

   He could have refused to sign the contract. “No way in Hell, man.”

   But he didn’t.

   If and when another player gives me something to work with, I’ll come up with twisted new ideas and outrageous new deals.

   That’s how you “build” a unique, interesting character: not by min / maxing everything all the time and replacing Clustered Shots with a better Metamagic feat, but with some funny, flamboyant, original backstories – and by actually doing crazy shit.

   Sometimes you get the impression that Mike Krahulik and Scott Kurtz don’t really understand how all the game mechanics work – and yet their characters are larger-than-life, and Krahulik’s and Kurtz’s presence at the table is impossible to ignore.

   If you’re dull and uninteresting, your overpowered Sorcedin or Wizarbarian will be dull and uninteresting; at the end of the day, the most important part of your build is you.

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   Our fact-obsessed culture has pokémonized the work of great authors like Tolkien, Lovecraft, and now, Frank Herbert.

   We gladly forget the writer’s original message, and focus solely on the characters or things he or she had to evoke in order to articulate that message. Cthulhu and Yog-Sothoth and Hastur and the Nightgaunts are unimportant in and of themselves – they are but the various embodiments of Lovecraft’s fear and chief concern: the unknowable.

   Since we cannot “play” with the message, we dismiss it out of hand – and invest all our efforts in the systematic enumeration and precise categorization of all those imaginary creatures. A Great Old One isn’t the same as an Outer God, the Outer Gods are totally different from the Other Gods, and so forth. We’ve created a set of Pokémon with HPL’s symbolism: now, the whole thing is gameable, and we know whether Cthulhu is stronger than Mother Hydra, whether a Mi-Go can kill a Fire Vampire, and if the Yithians are in fact older than the Flying Polyps.

   Formless Spawn of Tsathoggua, low-level card. Y’golonac, “EX” card. Nyarlathotep, “Break” card... You get the gist.

   Same thing with Tolkien. Can Saruman defeat a Nazgûl? Is a Troll stronger than Shelob? Could a Balrog actually vanquish King Fingon?

   In the Lord of the Rings video games, you assemble your formidable army, customize your Rohirrim, and recruit some Ents. We have made Middle-earth into one more game of Pocket Monsters.

   And now, since the release of Denis Villeneuve’s Dune, people begin to pokémonize the Duneverse, too. And why not? Someone on Facebook asked if the Jedi or the Sith could stand up against the Bene Gesserit.

   That’s certainly not the point of Frank Herbert’s books – but that’s where we are.

   We don’t care for metaphors; we want collectible, sortable critters and beasts.

   The systematic proliferation of minute, easily-accessed, easily-understood snippets of information is making the fluff a bit crunchier by the day. Creative Dungeon Masters could easily bestow new feats – or even a subclass – on any character through storytelling alone. You say: “Ever since you’ve been told that the Cat Lord might be your sire, you have developed a few thief-like skills. You can Hide in Shadows and Climb Walls...”

   Why not let DMs do that instead of feeding the endless stream of stuff that obsessive players can browse and choose and maximize?

   The overall trend is here to stay, I know.

   The only thing we can do is to manage and hopefully keep pokémonization within bounds at our own tables and in our own games.

   I guess I’m suggesting mental Poké Balls –– yes, kids, you got it right.